800,000 euro fine to a doctor, he prescribed thousands of medicines in 1 month to his mother

Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis made a serious revelation about the doctors who carry out illegal prescriptions.

Speaking to SKAI on Wednesday morning (16.20.24) shortly before the press conference at the Ministry of Health, Adonis Georgiadis referred to the shocking first findings of doctors prescribing drugs to steal money.

In fact, as he said, with thorough checks through EOPYY and IDIKA, 100 cases of different doctors have been caught in the “lens”.

“We have already sent the first notes for apologies, the first cases to the financial prosecutor and the financial police, as there will also be criminal sanctions, while we have also made the first calculations”, stressed Mr. Georgiadis.

At this point, the minister revealed that a fine of 800,000 euros was imposed by EOPYY on a doctor for thousands of illegal overprescriptions in just one month.

As the minister stated, this doctor was non-stop prescribing medicines, thousands of preparations, executing them in the same pharmacy and writing them to his mother with her AMKA. “He takes the drug and sells it,” he said.

“We’re going to get a lot of bass,” he pointed out.

“Mountain” of overprescriptions with up to 1,600 pieces of medicine

Finally, Mr. Georgiadis underlined that at least 50 million a year, with conservative calculations, the medicines that are written for EOPYY without being needed are calculated.

Then, during the press conference at the Ministry of Health, he announced that “the control will be done retroactively and backwards” adding that “it is estimated that at least 50 million euros are the drugs that are written every year to EOPYY without need to be written”.

“My mood is not punitive but to bring order. I am very sorry when in plain sight some bad doctors use e-prescribing in such an unfair and irresponsible way. This system can become a blank checkbook for a doctor who can use it for his own benefit”, he added.

“The effort we have been making in recent months for the waste of money and unjust enrichment is multi-layered and is done on the one hand through IDIKA in the first year and then thoroughly by EOPYY,” he said.

“I don’t blame the pharmacies because the pharmacist is obliged to carry out a prescription once it has been prescribed. But if a pharmacist sees that a doctor is prescribing the same drugs for the same patient, he should inform the EOPYY. It’s not spies, but a joint effort to deal with the problem of overprescribing,” he stressed.

“In the 100 new cases of doctors with overprescribing we found that in the first 8 months of 2024 they wrote 250 to 422 different drugs per patient. This means that each patient of these doctors received between 250 and 1,600 pieces of medicine. There is no person who takes such a quantity and does not greet this vain world”, said Mr. Georgiadis.

“It’s real nonsense for doctors to do this now that data is accessible in real time. And we can go back to the first day of electronic prescribing and these 100 will be checked retrospectively.”